303.6 (21.) 1. Conflitto sociale I. Jensen, Henrik. CIP a cura del Sistema bibliotecario dell Università di Pisa

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1 Rebellion and resistance / edited by Henrik Jensen - Pisa : Plus-Pisa university press, (Thematic work group. 2, Power and culture ; 4) (21.) 1. Conflitto sociale I. Jensen, Henrik CIP a cura del Sistema bibliotecario dell Università di Pisa This volume is published thanks to the support of the Directorate General for Research of the European Commission, by the Sixth Framework Network of Excellence CLIOHRES.net under the contract CIT3-CT The volume is solely the responsibility of the Network and the authors; the European Community cannot be held responsible for its contents or for any use which may be made of it. Cover: Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Smolin (1929- ), Petr Aleksandrovich Smolin ( ), The Strike, 1905 (1964), oil on canvas, Moscow, The State Tretyakov Gallery. FotoScala Florence 2009 by CLIOHRES.net The materials published as part of the CLIOHRES Project are the property of the CLIOHRES.net Consortium. They are available for study and use, provided that the source is clearly acknowledged. cliohres@cliohres.net - Published by Edizioni Plus Pisa University Press Lungarno Pacinotti, Pisa Tel Fax info.plus@adm.unipi.it - Section Biblioteca Member of ISBN: Informatic editing Răzvan Adrian Marinescu Editorial assistance Viktoriya Kolp

2 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s Ausma Cimdiņa University of Latvia, Riga Abstract In approaching Latvian dissidence poetry as the subject for a case study on cultural rebellion and resistance, it is important to recognize that in the USSR dissidence was a multinational movement and had a broad political and cultural frame of reference and complex causes. The theme of this chapter is cultural resistance; it can be claimed almost unequivocally that the Latvian poets of dissident sentiments who are the focus of this study devoted themselves to a search for a correct socialism and a true art of the word, and that they had no other or farther-reaching political goals and intentions within the time period in question. In Soviet Latvian poetry dissidence manifests itself in two ways: firstly as political dissidence, i.e., as the great dialogue with totalitarian power and ideology with a view to actualizing it and then to dissecting it poetically. Political dissidence necessarily implies a dialogue with power and in a way it means defeating this power with its very own weapons; secondly as decadent dissidence, i.e., by totally ignoring the thematic framework of totalitarianism and finding a refuge in poetry a possibility to reflect on something else. The history of the Latvian Soviet poetry of the 1960s undeniably provides proof of strong resistance and the negative consequences which dissidence entailed for the lives of the poets: a ban on publishing their works; public reprobation, defamation of the artistic qualities of their poetry; or even charges of high treason and deportation to Siberia. Nevertheless a particular thematic perspective on the Soviet Latvian dissident writing can be opened to examine the links between collaborationism and dissidence, belief and falsehood and the subtle borderline that divides them. Latviešu padomju 60.gadu brīvdomīgā dzeja, kas nepakļāvās padomju totalitārisma estētiskai glorifikācijai, skatīta kā daudznacionālas un multikulturālas nevardarbīgas pretošanās kustība daļa, kas aktualizē jūtīgus, ar PSRS sabrukumu, Latvijas valstiskās neatkarības atgūšanu un integrāciju ES saistītus jautājumus. Apceres uzmanības centrā ir izvirzīti trīs izcili latviešu dzejnieki Vizma Belševica ( ), Ojārs Vācietis (1933-

3 86 Ausma Cimdina, 1983), Knuts Skujenieks (dz.1936) un viņu 60. gados rakstītās dzejoļu grāmatas Elpa, Sēkla sniegā un Gadu gredzeni. Disidentisma strāvojums 60. gadu latviešu dzejā, literatūrā un kultūrā kopumā saistīts ar PSRS iekšpolitiskas un ārpolitisko krīzi un nacionālkomunisma kustības aktivizēšanos Latvijā. Skaidrojot disidentisma cilmi, norādīts, ka ar retiem izņēmumiem līdz 60. gadiem latviešu padomju dzejā valdīja padomju dzīvi apliecinošas tēmas un intonācijas, un tās spēcīgi jūtamas arī topošo disidentisma dzejnieku debijas krājumos, Belševicas Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris (1955) un Vācieša Tālu ceļu vējš (1956), tādējādi skarot arī disidentisma un kolaboracionisma problemātiku. Konstatēti divi disidences dzejas strāvojumi: 1) politiskā disidence kā dialogs ar varu par padomju ideoloěijai tuvām tēmām un to estētiska uzšíēršana (Vācietis); 2) dekadentiskā disidence poētiska distancēšanās no t.s. sabiedriski nozīmīgajām tēmām un aktualitātēm (Ziedonis, daļēji arī Belševica un Skujenieks). Latviešu padomju 60.gadu dzeja raksturota kā unikāls, gan vienojošām, gan konfiktējošām kultūras atmiņām bagāts vēstures avots starkultūru dialoga un sapratnes veicināšanai starp tautām un indivīdiem ar dažādu vēsturisko pieredzi. Theoretical reflections on the attempts of totalitarian regimes to construct a new cultural space play an important role in the history of European ideas and culture and are suitable to become the object of case studies. Latvia is one of those EU member states that were occupied both by Stalinists and by Nazis, and the totalitarian past plays an important role in the formation of the historical consciousness of the Latvian nation and its search for historical self-awareness. In the 20th century, Latvia witnessed two periods of particularly active invasion by the Soviet totalitarian culture: first, in the early years of the 20th century, during the revolutionary dictatorship; and then during the decades of Soviet occupation after World War II. These periods comprise a body of undebated topics that should be on the agenda of academic research. Not only in the realm of public and political discourse and deliberations but also in that of scholary history today we perceive substantial differences in the way such terms as Stalinist, Soviet, occupation, communist and the like are used: such is the case also with the notion of dissidence. This chapter is dedicated to the second period of the Soviet occupation, linked to the Second World War and the post-war experience and its reflections in Latvian culture, in poetry in particular, which is rightly considered the emergency response genre in literature because, in comparison to large scale works, poetry is capable of reacting faster and in a more straightforward way to changes in human life and perception of the world, and thus also reaching the reader. When approaching Latvian dissidence poetry as an object for case studies it is important to recognize that in the USSR dissidence was a multinational movement and had a broad political and cultural frame of reference and complex causes. Dissidence as a multinational and multicultural movement includes sensitive issues related to awkward

4 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 87 memories, which, with the demise of communism 1, the restoration of national independence and the accession to the EU, tend to be swept under the rug and expelled from the nation s own historical memory, as well as struck out of its cultural historiography. A selective attitude, with a tendency to highlight aspects which appear preferable today while understating inconvenient facts and works, is also apparent in the lives and literary biographies of the Latvian dissident poets as presented in encyclopedias and biographical lexicons 2. The second volume of the ten-volume Soviet Encyclopaedia of Latvia (1982), which among other things attempts to sum up the ideological essence of Soviet existence, contains an entry on dissidents. But dissidence is defined there as an anachronism, as something that manifested itself in the framework of religious movements and vanished by the end of the 18th century. The entry then goes on to indicate that in Mediaeval Europe those who did not accept Catholicism were commonly referred to as dissidents and that the issue of their civil rights was particularly central in 16th- and 17th-century England (Dissenters), in 17th- and 18th-century France (Huguenots) and Poland. Although the volume in question was published in 1982 when the court trials of the eminent Soviet dissidents, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and Andrei Sakharov, had already taken place and the Latvian dissident poet Knuts Skujenieks, a member of the so-called French group 3, had already been sentenced to 10 years in GULAG penal labour camps all these repressive measures were still very vivid memories the encyclopaedia makes no mention of the dissident movement in the URSS and Soviet Latvia. In fact, during the years of the Cold War 4, the USSR did not consider that such a phenomenon as dissidentism existed within its confines and the topic was taboo in Soviet historiography. It was foreign Sovietologists who dealt with this issue and crowned Sakharov, Solzhenitsyn and other free thinkers of the Soviet Union as dissidents. During the early years of glasnost 5 instituted by Mikhail Gorbachev, The Political Encyclopaedia published in Soviet Latvia by the principal editorial board for encyclopaedias provides the following definition: Sovietology: a specific reactionary trend in contemporary bourgeois science, propaganda and ideology which specialises in complex studies of economy, political system, history, culture and other aspects of the USSR and other socialist countries.[...] The majority of sovietologists falsify the home and foreign policy, lifestyle, social progress of real socialism. The use of the term sovietology spread widely in the 1960s. [...] Marxist-Leninist science does not engage in polemics with Sovietology 6. In the context of our study it is important to note the phrase not engage in polemics with Sovietology, which means not only disassociation but also a strict ban for Soviet scholars to handle the subject. This is also an indirect indication that dissidentism was regarded as a dubious term and a topic which was alien and unwelcome in Soviet science: As designated by the means of mass propaganda of imperialist countries, dissidents are people who deny the socialist system, engage in anti-soviet activity, break the Art and Resistance

5 88 Ausma Cimdina, law and, supported by the propaganda and intelligence centres of imperialist countries, actively fight against the socialist order 7. Sociologists of culture now write that dissident, in countries with mono-partite system, is a person who intellectually diverges from the official political line 8. To exemplify this, the URSS is mentioned, where dissidents are being exiled, thrown in jail, sent to labour camps, locked away in psychiatric hospitals or sacked 9. All the repressive methods listed are included in the CVs of the dissenting Latvian poets. In a broader sense, dissidents as free thinkers should be valued per se, regardless of their place of residence, political landscape in their motherland, age, sex, ethnic identity or race. Although the Latvian historian Henriks Strods did not claim to be formulating an allembracing interpretation of the dissidence movement in the USSR, we can agree with his statement that the aims and methods of action of the political opposition in the 1960s were rather varied, going from the search for a correct Leninist socialism and communism to the restoration of the Russian monarchy. The forms of resistance ranged over the whole spectrum of non-violent resistance, starting from political non-cooperation, cultural ressitance, emigration and escape to foreign contries, down to the formation of resistance groups and organisations 10. The theme Dissidentism and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s relates to the form cultural resistance took and it can be claimed, almost unequivocally, that the Latvian poets with dissident sentiments who are the focus of this study devoted themselves to the search for a correct kind of socialism and a true art of the word, and at that time had no other or farther-reaching political goals and intentions 11. A quest for an authentic communism and correct socialism, and propagating views that diverged from the offical government position, were rather widespread phenomena in Latvian prose and drama the 1970s too 12. The most striking works, in an artistic sense, and the works that show the greatest talent faced different fates: even if they possessed the same freethinking qualities, part of them received Soviet government awards but others, because of censorship, were relegated to the so-called literature for the drawer 13. In the present study, three outstanding Latvian poets are placed in the spotlight: Vizma Belševica ( ), Ojārs Vācietis ( ) and Knuts Skujenieks (born in 1936). The most prolific and meaningful period of their creative activity fell in the Soviet era, but their contribution to the literary and cultural life of Latvia has been so significant that they have all been included in the encyclopedia A Hundred Great Latvians, published in 2006: that is, quite some time after the restoration of Latvia s statehood and the accession to the European Union, after the national heritage values had been reassessed, applying particularly strict criteria to the literary legacy of the Soviet era 14. Dissidentism as a movement in culture and the repercussions caused by this movement in the society of the 1960s relate mainly to two genuine poetry collections: Elpa [Breath, Riga 1966] by Vācietis and Gadu gredzeni [Yearly Rings, Riga 1969] by

6 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 89 Belševica. Neither of these books can be considered works that belong to the genre of socio-political poetry, directly opposing Soviet power; essentially, this is meditative lyrical poetry imbued with motifs rooted in Latvian folklore or European culture or emotionally expressive publicistic poetry. In this poetry, the Communist Party leadership and official criticism saw dangerous deviations from the canons of the socialist realist genre in which there was no place for philosophical reflections on the meaning of human life or the life of a nation outside the Socialist paradise. Aesthetic Glorification of the Soviet State The institution through which the writers work was controlled, supervised and subjected to the dogmas of Socialist Realism was the Writer s Union of Soviet Latvia 15 and its periodicals a literary monthly journal called Karogs [The Banner] and a weekly paper named Literatūra un Māksla [Literature and Art], as well as Cīņa [Struggle], a daily produced by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Soviet Latvia 16. Soviet totalitarian culture was subjected to the dogmas of Socialist Realism, and one of the leading principles in the canon was severe thematic censorship. In relation to the history of Soviet Literature as a process, two inter-connected factors with some bearing on literary creativity are often invoked, namely, censorship and self-censorship which found expression in several ways, such as, on the one hand, though the exclusion of several thematic areas (the so-called taboo topics, such as non-soviet history); and on the other through the adoption of thematic approaches to validate the ideological values important to the Soviet State and society and to combat negativism, usually presented as relics from the past that hindered the progress of life. During first decade following World War II, for the purposes of Soviet patriotic education, special focus was placed on the theme of the War, which was called the Great Patriotic War in Soviet historiography, and continuous attention was devoted to the reflection of war in literature and art during the whole period of occupation. To give an idea of what this meant in practical terms, we reproduce here a fragment of a document, No. 85, entitled Recommendations by the Art Affairs Council of the Council of the People s Commissars of the Latvian S.S.R. regarding topics to be reflected in works of art. Thematic plan and a list of sample topics. This was proposed in November-December 1944 as a writers and artists vademecum: 1. Scenes of daily life and battles of the Red Army. Heroic deeds by Red Army commanders and political commissars at the Battle of Moscow; moving westwards and in the direction of Latvia. On the eve of an attack, Attacking a settlement, Admission into the Party after the battle, A sniper on mission, Capture of a prisoner, Awarding the banner of the Guards unit, Scouting, A political information session, Tank-borne infantry, Airborne assault landing, Combat medics on the battlefield, Actors at the battlefront. Art and Resistance

7 90 Ausma Cimdina, From the daily life of a reserve unit. Waking up in the morning (brisk morning mood), On training (in summer on a sunny day or in autumn in rain and mud; energy and impetuosity), On political training (focused attention), Leisure (evening games, cheerfulness), Amateur performance, Actors visiting, Leaving for the battlefront. 2. The fight of partisans against German occupants. In partisans headquarters, With partisans in the woods, Partisans reconnoitring, Signallers, An oppressor s trial, A traitor s trial, Young partisans, Portraits of the partisans. 3. Daily life and activities of Latvians in evacuation. Young woman Communist a tractor driver, Woman a blood donor, At the children s home, Factory and plant vocational school, Joint work in the kolkhoz, etc. 4. From the history of the Latvian nation. 5. The period of German occupation. New order in the countryside, Traitors of their own people, Hanging of civilians, In the Salaspils concentration camp, People beasts, Hiding a wounded commissar, Killing of children, Übermensch, Robbed, In the penal servitude of fascists, Manhunt, Running away (the Red Army is coming), etc. 6. Latvia free from the German occupants. Liberators are coming, On the shore of the Daugava River after banishment of Germans, Renovating the railway, Rally on 22 October 1944, The red flag above Riga once again, Returning to fields, Land surveyors working, Rebuilding industry, The school year starts, Portraits of strike-workers. 7. Landscapes of the homeland. Riga destroyed, The wide Daugava, The sea, Fields in crop, Forests, The golden autumn, Gaiziņkalns Hill in winter, Jelgava after occupation 17. A detailed clarification of the instructions laid down in the Party documents usually appeared in literary and cultural periodicals, and the document quoted above was no exception 18. The divergence of opinions and ideological tension that were the hallmarks of the Cold War dominats the opinions of once-warring countries, nations and individuals with regard to the historic significance of World War II and provide evidence of how instrumental the perspective on World War II as perceived in literature and culture was for the inculcation of the Communist ideology. An Eastern European historian, Erwins Oberlender, notes that the myth of the Great Partiotic War obviously has as great importance to the Russian Federation for shaping its identity as it had to the Soviet Union. In 1970s, the myth of Victory superseded the myth of the October Revolution as a symbol of collective identity. Today the victory in the Great Patriotic War can be said to be the only positive message left over from the USSR 19. How purposeful, persistent, at times bizarre and, nonetheless, effective the activities by the USSR CP in the ideological supervision and control over the creative process were

8 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 91 can be illustrated by an Extract from the visiting meeting of the Panel of the Ministry of Culture of the Latvian SSR on the occasion of viewing the design of the monument for the Year 1905 Park, with attendance of old Bolsheviks, dated 27 March 1959, Protokol No 90: [ ] Comrade Treimanis. This monument fails to express completely the spirit of the era. The figure of a woman, personifying Revolution, is unnecessary. The author has returned to the image from the time of the French revolution. The year 1905 is important to us. Do we find that in these figures? Of course not. The era related to the revolution of 1905 cannot be expressed in a single figure of a worker. Here is some young man or other, lost in thought, leaning against Revolution, seeking her support. And then the raised hand of the woman. That s not a call to revolution, to the battle, no, that s a warning Not a step forward, stay where you are! And as to the bas-relief, the people are walking towards the central figure. If the people went in the other direction, then it would seem that the woman is sending them to fight. But they are going the other way. The bas-reliefs hardly reflect the message. Comrade Krasovskis. You should have invited us when the idea for the design was discussed. Comrade Edžiņš. They should put a flagstaff in the man s hand. That will make him more dynamic. They should also remake the woman. [ ] 20. A curious textbook example of the cult of Socialist Realism in Latvian literature is a collection of poems Brāļu saimē [Fraternal Family, 1947] by Janis Sudrabkalns ( ) which received the USSR State (Stalin), award in It contains dedicatory poems that illustrate the theme very clearly, for example, Sarkanai Armijai [To the Red Army], Padomju tankam [To a Soviet Tank], Maskavai [To Moscow], Krievu tautai [To the Russian Nation], Padomju cilvēks [Homo Sovieticus], Padomju sieviete [Soviet Woman], Vecā Eiropa [Old Europe] and others of the same kind. The dogmas of normative aesthetics of Socialist Realism required that life in the URSS should be depicted as a de facto utopia where freedom, fraternity, equality and happiness thrive, in opposition to Old Europe that represented a dystopia where man is as a wolf to his fellow men. The euphoric mood of Fraternal Family dominated the scene of Soviet Latvian Poetry up to the 1960s, including the creative efforts of a new generation of poets who would later become dissidents. For instance, Vizma Belševica writes in her first collection of poems Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris [This Year the Spring is here the Whole Winter, 1955]: Laime ir dzīvot zem saules - kā pasaka zeme šī skaista. Laime līkst dzirksot Tev pāri kā varvīkšņots vasaras lietus, Un, lai to neatņem Tev, sardzē stāv Padomju valsts 22. [It is happiness to live under the Sun this land is beautiful like a fairytale. //Happiness streams over you like summer rain with rainbows//, and no one can take it away from you, not with the Soviet state standing on guard]. The suggestive power of the Fraternal Family and Moscow is also reflected in later dissident poets exchanges of letters. In 1954, Ojārs Vācietis wrote a letter to Jānis Sudrabkalns, emphasizing the suggestive impact that the collection of his poems Fraternal Family had on the poets of the new generation: My friend studies in Moscow. When Art and Resistance

9 92 Ausma Cimdina, moving to Moscow he could not manage to fit everything in his little suitcase. He threw out his towel and a bar of soap but your Fraternal Family travelled to Moscow: my friend could not live without it 23. The literary biographies of the poets mentioned above share another significant detail studies at the Maxim Gorky Literature Institute in Moscow, or less direct but sufficiently close emotional and creative ties with Moscow. In their early biographies, Moscow stands for Otherness in its intellectual and literary domain, a space for freedom of thought and expression, a symbol of solidarity between active writers. It was not yet perceived as a generator of totalitarian ideologies and dogmatic regulations. Literary critic Anda Kubuliņa writes: Vizma Belševica and other Latvian students in Moscow were a link with the world 24, i.e. she was teaching others to find their way in contemporary Russian literature, she was a keen reader of Solzhenitsyn, she had overcome her judgmental attitudes against the Russians and got in touch with other students of various ethnic backgrounds. This is confirmed by a quotation from the first collection of poems by Ojārs Vācietis, Tālu ceļu vējš [The Wind of Distant Roads, 1956], namely, the poem Maskava, māt! [Moscow, o Mother!]: Nu nākam mēs ar Dzintarjūras šalkām Pie tevis Maskava, pie Tevis māt! Nav tāda spēka, kas mūs uzvarētu Ar tevi, Maskava, ar tevi, māt! 25 [We now come to thee, Moscow, o Mother, with the murmur of the Amber/Baltic Sea! [ ] Nothing can beat us when we are with thee, Moscow, o Mother!] The collection of poems by Belševica, Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris [This Year, the Spring is Here the Whole Winter, 1955] which was published a year before Vācietis Tālu ceļu vējš [The Wind of Distant Roads] expresses more reserved but still special feelings for Moscow. For instance, a poem Vēstule draudzenei Uzbekijā [Letter to a Friend in Uzbekistan]: Mīļā Covik! Es atmiņā glabāju Kuplās liepas, ap Kremli kas zied. Tavu sirsnību, draudzene labā, Blakus Maskavas gaišajam tēlam 26. [Dear Tsovik! I still remember the bushy lime trees in blossom around the Kremlin. [ ] And your cordiality, my good friend, along with the bright image of Moscow]. The Origins of Dissidence The current of dissidentism reveals itself in Latvian poetry in parallel to the crisis in domestic policy and external relations crisis in the USSR reflected by the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the USSR (Moscow, 1956) that criticised the Stalinist cult and proposed measures for the liquidation of its consequences. This sparked the Na-

10 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 93 tional Communism movement in Latvia 27, which leads to the conclusion that the circle of dissidents included Communists as well as others. When speaking about the origins of dissidentism in Latvian poetry, one must bear in mind that, with few exceptions, themes and attitudes that glorified Soviet life dominated Latvian poetry until the 1960s. Although limited by censorship, publicly rebuked from the podiums of the Latvian Communist Party [LCP] Central Committee meetings and criticised by critics subservient to the regime, Belševica and Vācietis lived and wrote in Latvia. Their first collections of poems Belševica s Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris [This Year, the Spring is Here the Whole Winter, 1955] and Vācietis s Tālu ceļu vējš [The Wind of Distant Roads, 1956] took forward the poetic tradition instituted by Sudrabkalns. Skujenieks, an employee of the weekly Literatūra un Māksla [Literature and Art], did not live to see the publication of his first poetry book, being deported to Siberia in 1962, to a camp for political prisoners in Mordovia, where he created superb poetical works. For the wider public in Latvia, Skujenieks became known only in the late 1980s, when the collection of his lyrical and philosophical poetry, Iesien baltā lakatiņā [Bind in a White Scarf, 1986], was published, and especially after 1990, when the poetry book Sēkla sniegā [Seed in the Snow] saw the light, a part of the poems written in the camp in Siberia ( ) and in the author s own compilation. By contrast, Skujenieks composed his first pieces following the aesthetics and rules of Socialist Realism, and his first poem is entitled Padomju cilvēks [Homo Sovieticus,1950], just like the model poem in Sudrabkalns Brāļu saime [Fraternal Family]. Belševica and Vācietis were in possession of nearly all the faculties to become genuine Soviet poets as understood within the framework of Socialist Realism. They were of the right descent, belonged to the right social class, they had an acute sense of social justice, adequate literary education and their first collections of poems instilled hopes in Soviet apparatchiks that they were getting there. However, already in the middle of the 1960s, confronted with the reality of Soviet life, both adherents became tragically frustrated in their faith in Communist ideals, and this was reflected in their poetry. Ojārs Vācietis, winner of the USSR State Lenin Komsol prize who was rightly considered the most pro-communist poet in the history of Latvian literature, in his poem Partijas piederība [Party Membership] criticizes the real motivation of some of his fellow party members: Zagt Ar partijas biedra karti kabatā! 28 [To steal // With a member s card in your pocket!] The epistolary legacy of Ojārs Vācietis contains testimony about his discursive experience gained in theoretical discussions at the State University of Latvia and in the literary circles of Riga. He understood that the Soviet theories had deeply misrepresented the literary heritage of the period preceding Socialist Realism, Latvian folklore and my- Art and Resistance

11 94 Ausma Cimdina, thology being no exception. For example, the characters of the Latvian legend Lāčplēsis [Bearslayer] 29 depicting 13th-century events in Latvia, the tragedy Jāzeps un viņa brāļi [ Joseph and his Brothers, 1919] 30 and the symbolic drama Uguns un nakts [Fire and Night, 1905] by Rainis had been treated in such a way that: Bearslayer in his essence and strivings was a Bolshevik, the first Latvian Bolshevik. [ ] Joseph and his Brothers by Rainis is a striking example of Socialist Realism. Joseph already in his day and age went to look for unexplored lands. In the figurative sense, Rainis is a tractorist and Joseph with his brothers couplers. [ ] Antiņš is the party official of the village, Saulcerīte stands for collectivization and the seven ravens are kulaks [affluent farmers working for their own profit] who put obstacles to the setting up of kolkhozs [collective farms] 31. The Yearly Rings by Belševica and other collections of poems testify to the fact that one of the most peculiar characteristics of Latvian dissident poetry behind the iron curtain is an active presence of history (for instance, the poem Latvieša Indriía piezīmes uz Livonijas hronikas malām [The Notes of Henry the Latvian on the Margins of the Livonian Chronicle], as well as archetypal motifs from foreign cultures. It is the inter-cultural communication and metaphysical solidarity that counts amongst the most important sources of inspiration for resistance. A dissenting poet in Soviet Latvian poetry is often associated with the character of Don Quixote, as is the case in the poem Spānijas motīvs: mūžīgie donkihoti [Spanish Motif: the Eternal Don Quixotes] by Vizma Belševica from the collection of poems Gadu gredzeni [The Yearly Rings], impounded by Soviet censors. Belševica s Eternal Don Quixotes fight against the windmill of falsehood and deceit: Maļ vējdzirnavas melus Un meliem zemi baro. Lūst kauli, šíēpi nelūst, Un donkihoti karo 32. [A windmill grinds falsehood//and feeds the land on it.//the bones are broken, the spears do not break. And the Don Quixotes still wage war]. Reflecting upon his literary experience during the years spent in Siberian prisons, Skujenieks also accentuates the feelings of solidarity rooted in the cultural heritage of the world: Exile, prisons, torture, confication, psychiatric wards violence has accompanied literature from its very beginning, whether in the Roman empire, Mediaeval Europe, enslaved territories or national states. This conscious solidarity imparted a new dimension to life and to poetry 33. Vācietis poetry also takes root in a vaster cultural terrain and it reminds us that retaliation and keeping quiet for political reasons, as in totalitarian systems, is unfortunately an unmistakeable aspect of the history of culture. Creativity and distinction i.e. being different often catalyses a potent reaction from the immediate environment, as there is the

12 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 95 awkwardness that does not fit in with the communal atmosphere or with the institutional environment. The history of culture and intellect is full of examples of intolerance and even of the physical extermination of creative genius, not only in Latvia and not only in Soviet history, and the poet Vācietis in his Einsteiniana expressed this most eloquently: When the great meets with the miniscule When the known meets the unknown Then always The first fault: You have two hands We have two hands So why are you permitted To discover more than we? Against the wall! In flames! But the fault is only one That you are a Bruno That you are a Lorca That you are an Einstein Greatness that is treason! 34 In prose, including historical prose, it is easier to complete the manoeuvres necessary for self-censorship because a writer can take a rational decision as to how far he or she would like to develop a particular plot-line, what a character is going to say or leave out, in order to include it in a relative category of the good or the evil, and so forth, thus such prose can be reasonably consumable. Naturally talented poets do not have this margin for adjustments and they cannot subject themselves to self-censorship because genial poetic inspiration is born from an automatic reflex. In Soviet Latvian poetry dissidence manifests itself in two ways: (1) as political dissidence, i.e., as the great dialogue (according to Bakhtin) with power and ideology with a view to actualizing it and then to dissecting it poetically (Ojārs Vāciets). Political dissidence necessarily implies a dialogue with power and in a way it means defeating this power with its very own weapons; (2) as decadent dissidence, i.e., by totally ignoring the thematic framework of totalitarianism and finding a poetic refuge, a possibility to reflect on something else (Imants Ziedonis, partly also Vizma Belševica and Knuts Skujenieks). Decadent dissidence or passive resistance in the context of Latvia had a considerable, even crucial, role in stimulating and rejuvenating the national culture and creativity. For what reason? As revolutionary Marxism spread in Latvia at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, the phenomenon of decadence acquired the status of a socially harmful, dangerous, weird and transient phenomenon, marginal or extraneous to Latvian literature, so that it had to be eradicated at all costs. Subsequently, however, it exerted strong influence on culture in Latvia (including literary theory and criticism). The spectre of Art and Resistance

13 96 Ausma Cimdina, this marginal phenomenon as late as the 1960s was still resurrected to scare the intelligentsia of Soviet Latvia and to persecute poets who refused to glorify the progress of Soviet life and oddly persisted in their attempts to publish their apocalyptical and, at times, even decadent work. [ ] By way of example, the cycle of poems by Belševica Siržu seifs [A Safe-Box of Hearts] is permeated by flabby poetic images, aestheticism, subjective feelings that are unrelated to the social life of our society, in some cases even succumbing to fairly decadent trends 35. To illustrate the drawbacks attributed to decadence I would like to quote some passages from publications that were used as main points of reference through the generations from the early 20th century: We can no longer afford scoffing at our decadents just in some humorous journals we have to counter them at once and criticize them severely. The tree of our nation s freedom is now harbouring these harmful maggots 36. Scepticism scorn for any sign of optimism and hopes made decadents to delightfully linger over everything that is morbid, putrescent and disgusting, gilding it with the lustre of aestheticism (Baudelaire)[ ] Quite a few ex-naturalists lapsed into this philistine, spiritual barefootedness and anarchism 37. The decadent parasites did not perish instantly. To protect the realistic art that is rooted in the depths of the masses a continuous and relentless counteracting proved necessary 38. Decadence as a sign of degradation and disintegration of bourgeois literature first appeared in Latvia at the end of the 19th century. [ ] Decadents denied that art is related to life. [ ] Their works abounded in mysticism, sexuality, pornography, admiration of the basest instincts of a degenerate individual 39. Decadence (1) downturn, decline, degeneracy (of culture, its products), (2) reactionary bourgeois art, typically pointless and anti-social 40. The defenders of Soviet literature underscore that it is essential not only to get rid of the local chiefs of decadence and their henchmen but also to expose and destroy the theoretical foundations and philosophical idols on which decadence is based. As we can see, decadence there is mainly described in terms of a social-political rather than a literary movement, in its definitions its physical or biological component is emphasized particularly (degeneracy, disintegration, putrescence, sexuality, larvae, decadent parasites), as well as military, sports and legal terminology (battle, front, camp, assault, unmasking, exposing, manoeuvres, the decadent-in-chief, henchmen, advocate etc.). Dissidence and Collaboration, Belief or Falsehood The history of the Latvian Soviet poetry of the 1960s undeniably provides proof of strong resistance and the negative consequences which dissidence entailed for the lives of the poets. These took the form of a ban on publishing their works; public reprobation, defamation of the artistic qualities of their poetry (as in the cases of Belševica,

14 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 97 Vācietis), or even led to charges of high treason and deportation to Siberia (Skujenieks, members of the so-called French group and others). Nevertheless it would be useful to adopt a particular thematic perspective on Soviet Latvian dissident writing in order to examine the links between collaborationism and dissidence, belief and falsehood and the subtle borderline that divides them. Soviet Latvian dissident poetry was written in the framework of a strong cultural unifying force and we have to remember that the most distinctive poets who were at the forefront of the dissident poetry of the1960s were all members of the Communist party (except Knuts Skujinieks who was expelled when sent to Siberia in 1963). It has to be said that even in the texts by the most talented authors the signs of their partisanship can be felt as late as in the 1970s. For example, prosaist Regīna Ezera who by no means merits being labelled as fanatical collaborationist or a vehicle of Soviet ideology in her novel Nodevība [Betrayal], written in the 1970s and published in 1984, has an autobiographical character, a Writer or the nun of prose who, when asked what she would rescue from her house if it were on fire and she could only enter it once, answers that her priorities would be the following: (a) her grand-son; (b) a manuscript in progress; (c) her Communist party member card; (d) a dictionary of Latvian by Mülenbach and Endzelīns; (e) the novel Aija by Jaunsudrabiņš; and (f ) her dog 41. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the fact was revealed to the general public that, through the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Stalinist and the Nazi regimes had been active accomplices. Thus Latvian historiography had to formulate a new national opinion on 20th-century European history in its broadest international context, as well as to restore and adjust to its particular experience the identification framework of the Latvian people. That experience had been intentionally erased not only from the academic history writing but also from the nation s historical memory and artistic expression. An insight into the history of the Latvian Soviet dissident poetry and writing as a whole reveals a consistently complex mental picture and, in unison with contemporary historiography, makes one conclude and inquire: In Latvia we know that there was no Holocaust without Germans, but should we not also ask, did a Soviet regime without Latvians really rule for 47 years? 42 Latvian Soviet literature has been a battle arena with vivid examples of active and passive resistance as well as collaboration. Thus the poetry of the 1960s, in particular, may serve as a unique historical source, rich both in unifying and conflicting memories that are necessary nowadays to promote inter-cultural dialogue and understanding between nations and individuals with a differing historical location and experience. Art and Resistance

15 98 Ausma Cimdina, Notes 1 Politics of the Past: the Use and Abuse of History, Brussels 2009, p. 9. Published by the Socialist Group in the European Parliament, this report is also available at documents/2856_en_politics_past_en_ pdf 2 Encyclopaedias and biographical lexicons published after 1990s do not specify that any poet was a Communist Party member, which contrasts with reference literature published earlier in the Soviet Union, when the year of joining the Communist party was a material fact always specified in the biographies of the creative intelligentsia. 3 An informal group of authors and artists established during the second half of the 1940s in Riga. The KGB named it The French Group due to the fact that most of its members spoke French and convened to hear lectures and discuss French literature and culture. The KGB claimed that the group included 21 persons; 13 of them were convicted, and, in 1951, some of them were deported to Siberia for anti-soviet activity. Painter Kurts Fridrihsons, the group s leader, was sentenced to 25 years in prison and deported to Siberia. Presumably, the trial was staged by the Soviet authorities to intimidate the Latvian intellectuals. V. Blūzma, T. Jundzis, J. Riekstiņš, H. Strods, D. Šārps, Nevardarbīga pretošanās: Latvijas neatkarības atgūšanas ceļš, [Non-violent Resistance. Latvia s Way to Restoration of Independence ], Riga Here, the Cold War means the period from 1945 to 1990, when NATO and the Warsaw Treaty countries signed the so called November Treaty officially proclaiming the end to the Cold War. The end of the Cold War was symbolically marked by the dismantling of the Berlin Wall in Glasnost: a political course initiated by former USSR leader Mikhail Gorbachev took effect in 1986, and was aimed at liberalisation of a number of norms of Soviet life, an enhanced freedom of speech and more open foreign relations, including western countries. 6 Politiskā enciklopēdija, Riga 1987, p Ibid., p Ideju vārdnīca [The Hutchinson Dictionary of Ideas], Riga Ibid. 10 H. Strods, Prāgas pavasara atskaņas Latvijā [Repercussions of the Prague Spring in Latvia in ], in Latvijas Vēsture, 2008, 4, 72, p This is not quite true of Knuts Skujenieks who admits that his political illusions were dispersed by the camp for political prison in Siberia, where he spent seven years ( ) see J. Rokpelnis, Grāmata par Knutu Skujenieku [A Book about Knuts Skujenieks], Riga 2006; Solzhenitsin s necrologues attribute a decisive role in the collapse of the USSR to Siberian deportations and their reflections in literature: Padomju Savienība sakās ar grāmatu, ko sarakstīja Kārlis Markss, un beidzās, pateicoties Solžeņicina grāmatai Gulaga arhipelāgs [The Soviet Union emerged from the book written by Karl Marx and came to its end because of the Archipelago Gulag by Solzhenitsyn], in Diena, 5 August 2008, p To be named here are a novel by Alberts Bels, Saucēja balss [Voice in the Wilderness, 1973], dramas by Pauls Putniņš, Aicinājums uz pērienu [Invitation to Flogging, 1976] and Uzticības saldā nasta [Sweet Burden of Trust, 1981] etc. The dramatic conflict is most intense in a play by Gunārs Priede, Smaržo sēnes [The Fragrance of Mushrooms], a politically articulated drama, written in 1967, staged in 1988, that is, kept in the drawer for 11 years because of censorship. All three writers were members of the Writers Union of Soviet Latvia and of the Communist Party. 13 Writing for the drawer: in the 1960s and up to the early 1980s authors rather often use this phrase to characterise their own creative work. The authors knew and sensed what could be published and what could not, and guided by self-censorship did not offer their works to publishers. Thus the works incompatible

16 Dissidence and Soviet Latvian Poetry: the 1960s 99 with Soviet ideology were stored in the desk drawers of the authors themselves or in those of the publishers. 14 The works by all three poets were translated into foreign languages, mainly into Russian, Ukrainian, English, the languages of the Baltic and Scandinavian states; Skujenieks and Belševica have been translated into Swedish many times. Skujenieks is one of the most active translators of foreign poetry into Latvian, and for this has been awarded the Spanish order of Isabella the Catholic (1994), the Tomas Transtroemer Award in poetry (1998), the Order of the Grand Duke Gediminas of Lithuania (2001) etc. Belševica has been repeatedly nominated for the Nobel Prize in literature (no author from the Baltic States has yet received the Nobel Prize). 15 The Writers Union of the Soviet Latvia was founded on 26 October 1940, namely, during the first Soviet occupation, directly after the Red Army marched into Riga. During the German occupation, the Union s members were evacuated to Moscow and, having returned to Riga in October 1994 together with the Red Army troops, actively engaged in Sovietisation of Latvian literature. 16 Cīņa [Struggle] a paper of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist Party. As the paper of the Latvian Social Democratic Workers Party it had been published since March 1904 in Riga, and since July 1910 in various cities outside Latvia: in Brussels, London, Boston, Moscow, etc., and from October 1944 in Riga again. With the aim of highlighting the social significance of poetry, in the 1960s a tradition was launched to gather together representatives of intelligentsia on the New Year s Eve in the Cīņa editorial office, in order to look back at the outgoing year s poetic yield and to select the best poems, which were published in the New Year edition on 1 January. To mark the Cīņa s 80th anniversary in 1985, an anthology entitled Apcirkņi. Latviešu padomju dzejas gadi Cīņas lappušu skatījumā [Corn-bins. The years of the Latvian Soviet poetry as seen by Cīņa ], was introduced by the poem Partijas piederība [Party membership], a sample of Ojārs Vācietis dissident poetry. 17 Latvija padomju režīma varā, , Dokumentu krājums [Latvia under Soviet rule, A collection of documents], Riga 2001, pp For instance, A. Pelše, Lielais Tēvijas karš un mākslas darbinieku uzdevumi [The Great Patriotic War and tasks of art workers], in Literatūra un Māksla, 2 February 1954, p E. Oberlenders, Baltijas valstu okupācijas konfliktējošās kultūras atmiņas [Conflicting cultural memories of the occupation of the Baltic states], in Diena, 17 January 2009, p Latvija padomju režīma varā, , Dokumentu krājums [Latvia under the rule of Soviet regime, A collection of documents], Riga 2001, pp As a work awarded the Stalin Prize, Sudrabkalns Brāļu saimē [Fraternal Family] was translated into all the languages of the USSR peoples and saw several editions in Latvian (the last one in the 1984 series Ar PSRS Valsts prēmiju apbalvotie latviešu literatūras darbi [Works of Latvian literature awarded the USSR State Prize]); it was included in the educational curriculum and until the late 1980s served as a tool to indoctrinate Soviet patriotism at schools. Brāļu saimē [Fraternal Family] is a unique source of Latvian literary history, as it was able to assimilate all the basic principles of the normative aesthetics of Socialist Realism and also to reflect the dynamics of Soviet ideology under censorship, for instance, by erasing Stalin s name from the editions published after the personality cult was condemned. 22 V. Belševica, Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris [The Spring is here the whole Winter this Year], Riga 1957, p O. Vācietis, Raksti, 10. sēj. [Works, vol. 10], Riga 2003, pp A. Kubuliņa, Vizma Belševica, Riga 1997, p O. Vācietis, Raksti, 1. sēj. [Works, vol. 1], Riga 1989, p Belševica, Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris cit., p. 35. Art and Resistance

17 100 Ausma Cimdina, 27 An active movement of National Communism in Latvia dates back to The Latvian Communists opposed neither Latvia s incorporation into the USSR nor the model of the Soviet Socialism. However, they raised protests against the fact that the interests of the centre, i.e. Moscow and Russia, were set higher than those of Latvia. The general meeting in camera of the Central Committee of the Latvian Communist party on 7-8 July 1959 in Riga condemned economic, social and cultural initiatives by the National Communists and soon after the meeting Vice-Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Latvia, Eduards Berklāvs ( ), was suspended from duty and exiled to Vladimir in Russia. In 1971 Berklāvs organised the sending of a letter, signed by 11 Latvian communists, to communists in foreign countries. The letter that for the most part told about Latvia s Russification, made it to the foreign media and became the first document to bring message to the international community about the genocidal policy in Soviet Latvia. V. Blūzma, T. Jundzis, J. Riekstiņš, H. Strods, D. Šārps, Nevardarbīga pretošanās: Latvijas neatkarības atgūšanas ceļš, [Non-violent Resistance: Latvia s Road to Restoring Independence], Riga O. Vācietis, Raksti, 1. sēj. [Works, vol. 1], Riga 1989, p O. Lāms, The Interaction of Power and Culture in Perceptions of the Latvian Epic Lāčplēsis, in J. Osmond, A. Cimdiņa (eds.), Power and Culture: Identity, Ideology, Representation, Pisa F. Gordon, Latvians and Jews Between Germany and Russia, Stockholm - Riga - Toronto 2001, p O. Vācietis, Raksti, 10.sēj. [Works, vol. 10], Riga 2003, p V. Belseviča, Raksti, 1. sēj. [Works, vol. 1], Riga 1999, p K. Skujenieks, Raksti [Works], Riga 2002, p From the lecture Cietums literatūrā un literatūra cietumā [Prison in literature and literature in prison], delivered in Prague in 1996, at the conference of the Czech P.E.N. Centre. 34 O. Vācietis, Raksti, 1. sēj.[works, vol. 1], Riga 1989, p Turēt augstu partejiskuma karogu! [To keep the flag flying!], in Literatūra un Māksla, 23 March 1963, p J. Jansons (Brauns), Fauni vai klauni? [Fawns or Clowns], Riga 1908, p A. Upīts, Latviešu literatūra [Latvian Literature], Riga 1951, p LPSR ZA Valodas un literatūras institūta raksti [Papers of the Language and Literature Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the LSSR], Riga 1954, p Latviešu literatūras vēsture, 4. sēj. [History of Latvian Literature, vol. 4], Riga 1957, p Latviešu valodas vārdnīca [Dictionary of the Latvian Language], Riga 1987, p R. Ezera, Nodevība [Treason], 1984, p E. Oberlenders, Baltijas valstu okupācijas konfliktējošās kultūras atmiņas [Confliction cultural memories on the occupation of the Baltic states], in Diena, 17 January 2009, p. 12. Biliography Apcirkņi. Latviešu Padomju dzejas gadi Cīņas lappušu redzējumā [Corn-bins. The years of Latvian Soviet Poetry as seen by Cīņa ], Riga Apinis P. (ed.), A Hundred Great Latvians, Riga Belševica V., Raksti, 1. sēj.[collected works, vol. 1], Riga Id., Visu ziemu šogad pavasaris [The Spring is Here the Whole Winter this Year], Riga Blūzma V., Jundzis T., Riekstiņš J., Strods H., Šārps D., Nevardarbīga pretošanās: Latvijas neatkarības atgūšanas ceļš, [Non-violent Resistance: Latvia s Road to Restoring Independence], Riga 2008.